{"id":35,"date":"2013-02-23T14:53:06","date_gmt":"2013-02-23T14:53:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/yourbestlifenow\/?p=35"},"modified":"2013-02-23T16:58:25","modified_gmt":"2013-02-23T16:58:25","slug":"what-is-enlightenment-salvation-awakening-heres-the-short-answer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/2013\/02\/what-is-enlightenment-salvation-awakening-heres-the-short-answer.html","title":{"rendered":"What IS Enlightenment? Salvation? Awakening? Here’s the Short Answer…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I find Mark Nepo thoughts so inspiring. His devotional today inspired the following insight.<\/p>\n

Enlightenment (or, salvation, or awakening, or whatever you’d like to call it) is not some lofty place of achievement reserved only to those who struggle, strive and only then arrive at a level of life and living they imagine as pure bliss. No, enlightenment is simply learning how to live by the impulse you feel within.<\/p>\n

This does not mean living impulsively. Which IS<\/em> how I have lived much of my life.<\/p>\n

Instead, it is simply following what your heart says to do.<\/p>\n

Instead of hesitating or debating with the impulse or stepping away from the immediate feeling as to what you should do, you step toward it instead.<\/p>\n

And, what happens when you step toward the impulse?<\/p>\n

You step into bliss.\u00a0Into yourself.\u00a0Into God.<\/p>\n

So then, what is your heart saying now?<\/p>\n

Live by the impulse and you’re living “Your Best Life Now!”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I find Mark Nepo thoughts so inspiring. His devotional today inspired the following insight. Enlightenment (or, salvation, or awakening, or whatever you’d like to call it) is not some lofty place of achievement reserved only to those who struggle, strive and only then arrive at a level of life and living they imagine as pure…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":551,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[19,48,45,50,49,47,46,51],"class_list":["post-35","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-enlightenment","tag-awakening-2","tag-bliss","tag-enlightenment-2","tag-impulse-you-feel-within","tag-live-by-the-impulse","tag-mark-nepo","tag-salvation","tag-what-is-your-heart-saying"],"yoast_head":"\nWhat IS Enlightenment? Salvation? Awakening? Here's the Short Answer... - Your Best Life Now<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/2013\/02\/what-is-enlightenment-salvation-awakening-heres-the-short-answer.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"What IS Enlightenment? Salvation? Awakening? Here's the Short Answer... - Your Best Life Now\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I find Mark Nepo thoughts so inspiring. His devotional today inspired the following insight. Enlightenment (or, salvation, or awakening, or whatever you’d like to call it) is not some lofty place of achievement reserved only to those who struggle, strive and only then arrive at a level of life and living they imagine as pure…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/2013\/02\/what-is-enlightenment-salvation-awakening-heres-the-short-answer.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Your Best Life Now\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-02-23T14:53:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-02-23T16:58:25+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/yourbestlifenow\/files\/2013\/02\/stepping-into-the-impulse-300x238.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"smcswain\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"What IS Enlightenment? 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But not always in this order. On the university campus, I teach students the Art of Communication. In my public talks, however, I teach leaders the Art of Leading; I teach everyone the Art of Living...so that... when you come to the end... and, you will come to the end... You're able to look back on life feeling... Fulfilled... Accomplished... Content, Peaceful, and Happy, too... Knowing your brief but important journey has made this world a more... Conscious... Compassionate, and... Charitable place. What could possibly be more important than this?","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.stevemcswain.com\/"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/author\/smcswain"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/551"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35\/revisions\/40"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}